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Monday, November 12, 2012

Ah, Gettysburg

With all the clashes of 1862 that received nary a mention in the catalogs of 2012, we can take comfort in being fully compensated for the loss with a fresh sequence of ground breaking studies dealing with an all but unknown 1863 battle.

A Field Guide to Gettysburg: Experiencing the Battlefield through Its History, Places, and People by Carol Reardon and William Thomas Vossler.

Gettysburg: Lee's Grand Gambit by Jason M Frawley.

Gettysburg: The Story of the Battle with Maps by Stackpole Books eds.

Gettysburg: The Last Invasion by Allen C. Guelzo.

Eyewitness to Gettysburg by James I. Roberston.

Gettysburg, 1863 by Brooks D. Simpson.

TIME Gettysburg by Time Magazine ed. staff.

Gettysburg: A Graphic History of America's Most Famous Battle and Turning Point of The Civil War by Wayne Vansant.

The Gettysburg Campaign in Numbers and Losses: Synopses, Orders of Battle, Strengths, Casualties, and Maps, June 9 - July 14, 1863 by J. David Petruzzi and Steven Stanley.

Confrontation at Gettysburg: A Nation Saved, a Cause Lost by John Hoptak.

Just an early sampling. I could count on one hand (with four fingers shot off by a Minie ball) how many of the above I actually want to read.

5 comments:

I wish more obscure battles got more attention but I don't really mind the books Gettysburg gets. Napoleonic buffs don't like at all the attention that is given to Waterloo but there have been some really wonderful books on the subject over the years. D Day-Normandy and battle of the Bulge could be looked at the same way when talking about World War II or for the Eastern front Stalingrad.

I think the ebb and flow of these legendary battles draw people to study and write about them. They are really larger than life. I mean Gettysburg did really have everything and was pretty epic but in the same breath I totally as a understand as a Civil War reader the want for a nice readable, detailed account of something like Steele's part of the Red River campaign in 1864 or another look at Iuka and Corinth even after Cozzens'.

Hello DrewThanks for the update. I wish I could say I'm surprised, but I'm not. I'm sure at some point, someone will write another very readable Gettysburg Campaign history. Till then, Coddington and Sears suffice for me.

I was very heartened to see Hess's Knoxville, Daniel's Stones River, Hartwig's and Jordan's South Mountain and I'm sure I've missed some. In 2013,we will see Hess's Kennesaw Mountain and Powell's Chickamauga. I wonder if Francis O'Reilly is working on something? I've not read his Fredericksburg book, but have heard him speak. I hope at some point he does more writing.

It still is hard to understand why some of the lesser known battles continue to be ignored and we are bludgeoned with Gettysburg.